Flood relief trickles out, cautiously, from Pakistanis in US (Feature)

By Anindita Ramaswamy Aug 25, 2010, 1:42 GMT

Washington - As Pakistan's flood waters surge forward like a slow-motion tsunami, Pakistani-Americans are responding - hesitantly and cautiously - in what appears to be a sluggish build up to meeting the immense needs of their home country.

Mohammad Razvi, co-founder of the Council of Peoples Organization (COPO) in Brooklyn, New York, goes to great lengths each day reassuring community members their donations will be channeled directly to the flood victims, without any intervention from the Pakistan government.

'Pakistanis in the US have big-time reservations about donations being sent to the government. People have lost faith in (Pakistan President Asif Ali) Zardari's government,' Razvi told the German Press Agency dpa.

He noted the difference in giving after the 2005 Kashmir earthquake, when COPO - which helps integrate low-income South Asian Muslims, especially new arrivals - collected 110 tons of goods: 'People are coming forward with less this time, also because of the economic downturn.'

COPO has collected two truckloads of canned food and arranged with Pakistan International Airlines to transport the goods for free.

Razvi, who has been in the United States for 36 years and considers Brooklyn home rather than his birthplace of Lahore, says the photograph of philanthropist and Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates stuck on his office window keeps him motivated in this tough economy.

'We're initiating relationship-building sessions at iftars all over New York with the message that the time of need is the time of giving,' he said.

This is the month of Ramadan after all, when the day-long fast is followed by a feast at the iftar meal. It's the time when Muslims believe that every good deed performed, each prayer said and all acts of charity will generate rewards several times over.

'We are encouraged to give during Ramadan,' said Rabiah Ahmed, spokeswoman of Islamic Relief USA, the largest Muslim charity in the US. 'It is the most generous time of the year.'

She acknowledges the overall perception of inert aid flows. Some of it is donor fatigue in the aftermath of the earthquake that shattered Haiti in January, killing more than 220,000 people.

'We are trying to combat the distrust people have through awareness drives using social media. We emphasize we don't work with any governments. We've also turned iftar community dinners into fundraising events,' Ahmed told dpa.

Islamic Relief has raised 23 million dollars in donations of supplies and has increased its fundraising goal to 4 million dollars in cash.

Charity Navigator, a New Jersey-based organization that evaluates non-profits, outlines a few reasons for the apathetic charitable reaction to the floods. Apart from Haiti, donors also responded to the February earthquake in Chile and the oil spill along the US Gulf Coast in April.

'In contrast to the coverage of the earthquake in Haiti, the media coverage of the Pakistan floods has been minimal. As they say, out of sight, out of mind,' the group said on its blog.

'Even with concerns over corruption and ineptitude, some may view the government in Pakistan as being more able to care for its citizens than, for example, the government in Haiti.'

More than 30 per cent of Haiti's civil servants died in the earthquake, which hit hardest in the capital Port-au-Prince, where the headquarters of 28 of 29 government ministries collapsed.

'It is very difficult to compare Pakistan and Haiti. You have one country - the poorest in our region and very close to the United States. You have Pakistan some distance away, and that has influenced ... the level of media attention,' US State Department spokesman PJ Crowley said Tuesday.

'An earthquake is a different kind of disaster than a flood. We'll be dealing with the effects of the earthquake in Haiti for a decade or more. We'll be ... helping Pakistan deal with the impact of the flood for years, but probably a disaster of less duration and a different kind of impact.'

The United Nations says 17 million people have been displaced by the floods - impacting more than the combined population hit by the Indian Ocean tsunami in 2004, and earthquakes in Kashmir and Haiti.

Rafi Niazi, 54, a taxi driver who has lived in Washington since 1980, says he doesn't trust Zardari and would 'send money to Imran Khan (the former cricketer) because he is the only honest politician.'

Zardari, the widower of former Pakistani premier Benazir Bhutto who was assassinated in 2007, spent several years in prison but was freed in 2004.

Whatever little hope there was in 2008, when Zardari became the first civilian leader of the country in a decade, has turned into bitterness and anger for many Pakistanis both at home and abroad.

But Niazi's indifference to the floods is also because 'all my people are here and not there,' he says, explaining how is family is spread across North America and why Pakistan is no longer home.

He isn't watching the disaster unfold on TV.

'Floods are floods. What can we do?' Niazi asks. 'We have no control. Just like Hurricane Katrina, Rita ... now the Pakistan government will have to rebuild all the towns and villages, but it is too corrupt and doesn't care about the people.'

Niazi last visited Pakistan 14 years ago and has no desire to return: 'My children were born here. They're American. I'm American.'

'There's nothing in Pakistan. It's all messed up,' he says. 'People there are either too rich or too poor. There's no middle class. There's no chance for someone like me.'